When the Struggle Isn’t Really About Sex
Perhaps what is behind every compulsion is a soul looking for rest
After working with people trapped in cycles of sexual compulsivity, one pattern surfaces repeatedly: the behavior rarely begins with sexual desire.
It begins with pain.
We often assume that sexual addiction is, at its core, a problem of lust. A sex-crazed brain with an insatiable appetite for pleasure. Consequently, the church has largely responded with more confession, more purity pledges, and more spiritual disciplines. Try harder. Want it less.
In truth, while sex-crazed people do exist, they are vastly outnumbered by another population.
Tortured Restlessness
After working with people trapped in cycles of sexual compulsivity, one pattern surfaces repeatedly: the behavior rarely begins with sexual desire. It begins with pain. With loneliness. With a crushing sense of inadequacy, or an anxiety so relentless that a person will do anything just to make it stop.
This is both a clinical observation and a spiritual one. These are souls searching for a relief that only God was ever meant to provide, finding a counterfeit instead. Augustine understood this long before modern psychology: “Our heart is restless, until it repose in Thee.”
Compulsive behavior is tortured restlessness looking for rest in the wrong places.
These are the poor in spirit, to whom belong the Kingdom of Heaven.
Trapped in the Cycle
In the wake of my own betrayal trauma and subsequent divorce, I entered one of the most extensive periods of pornography consumption of my life. A fly on the wall would conclude I was horny and perverted. Yet my behavior did not start with desire. It started with the pain of my reality: I was unwanted by my wife. I wanted to flee from the pain of seeing all my dreams for the future dashed. And in my fantasy, I could experience the illusion of being wanted.
Those of us who keep falling aren’t simply weak-willed or licentious. More often, we are people who learned, perhaps in childhood, that emotions were dangerous or unbearable, and therefore had to be numbed.
The problem is that we stumbled upon one of the most potent numbing agents available. It worked so well that it became habitual, and with the habit came a chronic feeling of being the worst of sinners. These are the poor in spirit, to whom belong the Kingdom of Heaven.
Yet what happens when the poor in spirit cannot find their rest in God’s grace? They find it in the very thing that makes them feel like the worst of sinners, and thus the tormented cycle continues.
Unconditional Welcome
Breaking this cycle doesn’t depend on a tighter lockdown on our behavior. It begins with genuinely acquainting ourselves with our pain. Practically speaking, the next time you feel pulled toward a compulsive sexual behavior, ask yourself: “What reality am I trying to escape right now?” The answer may reveal exactly where God wants to meet you.
The grace of God invites us to treat ourselves less as messes to clean up, and more as souls to be known. How God meets us in that quiet, safe space remains a sacred mystery. Perhaps for the first time in a long time, we will find He is the very relief, the unconditional welcome, we have been exhausting ourselves to find elsewhere.
Roy Kim, MA, MDiv, LMFT is the founder of New Legacy Family Counseling, Inc., where he helps individuals heal from sexual addiction, betrayal trauma, and divorce. A former pastor in the Korean American church, Roy attempts to bridge the gap between the Church and these often-taboo topics. Roy enjoys creating educational content through his YouTube channel and hosts three podcasts: The Same Boat, New Therapist FAQ, and SA Speakeasy. He is also a certified LEGO Serious Play Facilitator, using hands-on building exercises to help universities, churches, and nonprofits explore and solve leadership, team dynamics, and organizational challenges.
About Centering
Centering: The Asian American Christian Substack is a publication of the Asian American Center at Fuller Seminary (AAC). At the AAC, we train and support Asian American Christian leaders of East, Southeast, and South Asian descent, including multiracial individuals and adoptees—grounding their life and work in over 170 years of Asian American history, and addressing their spiritual and psychological concerns.
We do this work through our cohorts, seminary courses, and the programs of our initiatives. The AAC is home to the Asian American Pastoral Formation Initiative, the Asian American Well-Being Collaboratory, the Asian American Christian History Institute, the Filipino American Ministry Initiative, and the Korean American Ministry Initiative.
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 | A guest post by
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Grateful for who you are friend and for your deep wisdom and care for authenticity/connection.
I appreciate your candor!
I've found that all of the corruptions of appetite I've struggled with, including the sexual appetite, follow the pattern of dissatisfaction in the name of satisfaction.
In other words, the more I chase satisfaction through consumption, or excitement, or experience - the more dissatisfied I am at the end. And our appetites are by nature never finally satisfied, so the cycle continues.
The thing that helped me to see this trap and to finally break free was Joy - which is always and only experienced in the present moment (instead of fantasising of future satisfaction).
The trap is revealed in the Odyssey, but the keys to freedom are only in Scripture:
https://andrewsawyer.substack.com/p/the-way-home-part-5-the-aeolian-bag